In Class Movie - Psycho

I can relate to the Anthony Perkins' character more than I'd like to admit in public. In the movie Psycho, he delivers a commanding performance of a man who's been living under Mom's rule for so many years that when he finally snapped, he took on the personality of dear ol' mom after her untimely demise. No, I wouldn't say that I could ever go that far to get out from under the thumb of my matriarch, but thoughts aren't actions, and sometimes, just sometimes...

Being a cinefile type, watching movies either in the house or at the theater, I don't socialize very well with people that aren't in my same circles. A dark room is perfect for me most times. However, when the times call for it, I love to watch a movie with friends and then talk about them afterwards.

Homework Film - 400 Blows

Going from the documentary High School to The 400 Blows was seemingly simple. 400 Blows is the first movie from French Director François Truffaut, the movie follows a character based on his own life, so it feels like a documentary. Using real locations such as the carnival ride where Jean-Pierre Léaud, who played Antione, is playing hooky with his friend looked incredible. Later on, I was disapointed that his friend Rene couldn't visit him in the reform school. Come to find out that was based entirely on real events from Truffaut's life.

I noticed there were longer takes and less different angles for takes even for close up shots. It must have been difficult to set up for those shots back then, but it really shows how much thought was put into every take. The scene near the end of the movie where he was running must have taken tremendous effort and planning. To set up that long of a shot, and to have the young Leaud run that in one take looking like he wasn't breaking a sweat, could have been a scene from a running documentary.

In Class Movie Comparisons - Night & Fog, High School

Alain Resnais' documentary Night & Fog - 1955 (Nuit et brouillard) is one of several true-life accounts of the horrors of German Concentration camps. Taking actual footage from the times and inter-cutting newer footage of the locations current to filming doesn't change what they were. He tells a story of vacationers stopping to take photos in front of a crematorium as if it were a friend’s home. It's very difficult to imagine that there are people that don't believe the Holocaust ever happened.

Frederick Wiseman's portrayal of High School in the late sixties was a fly-on-the-wall depiction of schools of the time. Today's teachers would be fired for how the detention instructor talked to the boy wrongfully detained for something he didn't do. There were also a number of stereotypical teachings being shown in this particular high school. The girls were mostly taking typing classes and fashion design. The Beatnik teacher reading a Simon & Garfunkel poetry reading also illustrated what was happening in that time period.

Homework Film - Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

I spent two hours being verbally abused and manhandled into submission by the likes of two very powerful performances by Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton as the long married Martha and George. Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a look into married life, for those who haven't been married before.

A miscommunication leads this whole evening into the depths of marriage hell as we see husband and wife insulting, jabbing, and berating each other in front of unexpected company (at least the husband's expectations). In real life today, that marriage would have ended in divorce long before the movie took place. Having seen fights like this with couples I've known before, I'm surprised some of them are still together. Like in the movie, the couples that are still together have a strong dose of liquid courage some nights to "Brave" the course.

To my surprise, this was Mike Nichols' feature film debut, coming from television. His career has spanned four decades and is still going strong. Next up for him is an adaptation of Akira Kurosawa's High and Low from the 1960's.

In Class Movie - Rashomon

Watching Rashômon in class was a real treat. I wanted to watch another Akira Kurosawa movie for a while. Set mostly in the woods, Kurosawa used them as a backdrop for a domestic crime. Toshirô Mifune plays the Bandit, who becomes exuberant when asked what he did in the woods just three days earlier. Having to sort out the details from four points of view was an incredible experience. The bandit's story points him as a larger than life character trying to win Machiko Kyô's heart away from her husband. Her story places her as a horrible victim, and the late husband's story told through a medium explains a balance between the two previous stories. To paraphrase the scene with the commoners, "Why would a dead man tell lies?"

The truth came out in the final explanation of someone not directly involved. The wood cutter found the body, but wasn't part of the plot. His version shows the woman as a whore trying to leave her husband for the Bandit, and neither one wants her. She ends up calling them both cowards for not wanting to fight for her hand. They reluctantly did fight, but neither men wanted to.

I don't think the Bandit killed him. The wife looked most likely to have done the crime. Her sob story doesn't fool me. She wanted to leave him but under their beliefs they couldn't unless death.

Ultimately I think the woodcutter came out with the dagger in the end. He found the body and when he was explaining the story, he said there wasn't a dagger, but the husband was killed with a sword.

Mifune had a standing position in Kurosawa's films. He's done over half a dozen films with the director. They have worked on cultural adaptations of Hamlet and other novels.

Extra Credit - Repo! The Genetic Opera

Blending two things I enjoy a lot, music and movies, Repo! The Genetic Opera wasn't all that I hoped for in a musical. I have seen Rocky Horror a few times, both in the theater and on DVD and Repo doesn't come close to it's predecessor as far as story and talent. I did enjoy the blend of the comic strip intro and the "graverobber" as the narrator, but I just felt too forced into the songs, and the characters. The sets and costumes were a good fit for the story and I really like the visual affects for the transitions

Alexa Vega now has something other than the Spy Kids movies to her list of roles she has played. Paul Sorvino goes over the top as the head of an evil corporation bent on ruling the world through genetics and body parts. It all seems too much to hold together as a musical, but I would have rather seen it as a straight narrative story. Darren Lynn Bousman directed this after his Saw experiences on 2 through 4 of that series. Darren Smith & Terrance Zdunich wrote and had parts in the film as well. Rounding out the eclectic cast is Paris Hilton, Sarah Brightman, Bill Moseley and Joan Jett who went uncredited but her distinctive look and sound was obvious.

Homework Movie - Nights of Cabiria

Having a weekend of movies was no surprise for me. This movie however took a great deal of time and effort to watch. I had begun to watch Nights of Cabiria in the early afternoon but was rapidly fading on the couch because my eyes were straining to read the subtitles. So I tried again after taking a nap. This proved much better because I was able to follow the films character through all of her terrible choices for companions. Giulietta Masina played a wonderfully tragic lady of the night who wanted to believe her callers for what they said right up to the very end.

Relationships like these don't just happen in the movies. I think I have had one or two like this where even though I knew someone wasn't telling the whole truth, I took it for face value because I so wanted to believe what she was telling me. It's these lessons that have hardened some, but like Cabiria, I too hold onto the possibility that one day I will find a love that will be as true to me as I am to her.

I think one of my favorite scenes in the movie has to be a more comical point when Cabriria was trying to get into the club with the actor. Her tough time getting through the curtains made me laugh for a bit. I've definitely done that once or twice before.

Extra Credit - Baby Mama

Having a sick loved one, you may come across some movies that you may not want to watch, but you end up watching because they want to. This was a pick for my girlfriend who isn't feeling her best at the moment. I picked Baby Mama up at our local library, which coincidentally has a great DVD selection that rivals some chain rental houses. We watched this after some reheated chinese food together and it was a really funny movie. Sure there were parts that I was watching through my fingers because it was painfully funny, but it was funny. Tina Fey and Amy Poehler are hilarious together and the other cast rounded out by a former SNL alum, Steve Martin, and Sigourney Weaver makes this a heart warming movie about what lengths a single woman could go to in order to have, truly, it all.

Extra Credit - Paranormal Activity

Sitting in a dark room with total strangers just waiting to be scared is a total rush. This movie was made for a measly $11k and has already surpassed that by 7x's in it's two weeks in theaters. It had premiered at Slamdance's 2007 film festival and has been waiting for the right moment to be released. Oren Peli directed, wrote, edited and produced the movie, but with such a small budget we don't see him in the movie. The fact that there wasn't any credits to the movie at all was surprising. I waited through to the blue ratings notice at the very end and there was nothing.

The reaction was amazing at the payoff. There wasn't anyone that left the theaters from where I was sitting. The people I talked to outside afterwards said that their first two times seeing it people walked out in the last 5 minutes. There was a great deal of nervous laughter in the audience when things would happen. I felt that this was what Blair Witch should have been back in 1999. There wasn't as much shaky camera movement as Micah Sloat put the camera on a tripod for most shots. His fiancee Katie Featherston was the "subject" of the movie.

Go check this movie out, but "don't see it alone"

Extra Credit - Whip It

So, there wasn't a wait in line for Whip It like I thought there would have been only a week after it came out. I got to the theater about 15 minutes early and I was the only one sitting to see what I think was the most heart-warming story I've seen this year, so far. Not ever having played roller-derby, I could still relate to the message in this movie about defying the "normal" way of life. Just like Ellen Page's character, I am paving my own path with the career I've chosen to study. This movie isn't like your typical boy-meets-girl romantic girlie movie. This was about standing up for what you believe in, or what you want to do with your own life instead of letting people choose for you. I nearly cried when character Marcia Gay Harden's character read the note from her daughter.

This was a perfect directorial debut for Drew Barrymore, who also played a character in it who happened to be on the ground more than skating in the movie. She has a knack for being a more physical comedian than people give her credit for. It was also good to see the likes of Daniel Stern, and Juliette Lewis who played Dad and one of the rival skaters respectively. There were so many awesome real life derby girls that were in it as well.

If you haven't seen this movie yet, what are you waiting for? Go see it... And remember, you CAN do anything if you put your mind to it!

Extra Credit - Dr. Horrible's Sing - Along Blog

I couldn't keep myself from laughing, even the third time I watched Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog in the same week. The fact that it's such a short movie is not a deterrent. All that comedy in such a great small package. The fourth wall broken for such a long time is not a bad thing when it comes to the premise to the movie. The fantastic characters that are so layered in the short time just adds to the interesting part of the movie. For instance, a villain (Neil Patrick Harris) that doesn't want to meet with a nemesis in a crowded park because of the children? A hero (Nathan Fillion) that exclaims how he's "Totally had sex" with a new girlfriend? All of the main dialogue is sung and the lyrics are so catchy that after leaving the movie at home, I catch myself singing the songs (to the best of my ability, cause I really can't sing). It's a great view for fans of catchy comedy and fun musicals. Written and directed by Joss Whedon in 2008, it was only released online, but is packaged as a tv miniseries.

Extra Credit - Jennifer's Body

After getting to the theater already playing the trailers before the movie, I had to deal with the only other group of people talking over the intro of Jennifer's Body. This is the latest by writer Diablo Cody who has such a way with her dialogue that I can understand it, even though I can't necessarily relate to it. There are subjects like girl problems and high school social issues that Megan Fox's character and Amanda Seyfried dealt with that I could relate to on some level being a guy, I felt sympathy for both.

Ultimately in the end I enjoyed the movie for it's story and some of the scenes, but mostly the dialogue. It seems like such a fresh take on how the "youth of today" speaks that it's very believable. Wonderfully directed by Karyn Kusama who has only three movie under her belt, but we should take note for future projects.

Extra Credit - Double Feature: Lost Boys & Near Dark

There's only a hand full of movies that can be watched over and over again from when I was a child, and The Lost Boys is definitely one of them. The Coreys are at their best playing opposite each other: Corey Haim as the new kid in town and Corey Feldman as one half of the Frog Brothers. Watching this in the Castro Theater was amazing. The ticket booth was separate from the rest of the building and there was just enough room for one ticket person. Just beforehand my girlfriend and I had dinner next door and ran into another classmate and her boyfriend and so it became an impromptu double-feature double-date.

When it came time for the second feature Near Dark, I was excited to find out that my classmate hadn't seen either movie and was glad to hear that she liked Lost Boys. It had been a long time since I had seen Near Dark and it was like watching a new movie all over again. Bill Paxton was the highlight for me because Near Dark couldn't hold a candle to Lost Boys for me. Kathryn Bigelow and her writer companion Eric Red wrote a great story for the time, but there wasn't a lasting impression like I felt from LB.

Homework Film - Rebel Without a Cause

One of the most reveled classic films of all time, Rebel Without a Cause stars James Dean and Natalie Wood in what would be one of Deans last two films. I watched this movie with my 9-year old son and his grandmother after a long day working on house cleaning and homework. I couldn't find popcorn at home so I went to our scouting fundraiser to get a tub of carmel corn just to watch the movie.

The real locations used in the movie like the observatory were much cooler to see than a studio back-lot. The "Chickie Run" was something I've seen recreated in a few music videos in the 80's and 90's. All in all, I liked the acting despite the random nature of the characters, perhaps part of their "Characters".

Extra Credit - Zombieland

The Theater was packed with twenty-somethings and goth "kids" for the almost sold out midnight screening of Zombieland starring Jesse Eisenberg who was last seen in Adventureland, Woody Harrelson who we may love from shows like Cheers or Natural Born Killers, Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin of Little Miss Sunshine in an amazing "breakout" role for her. Ruben Fleischer as a first time director, I will be looking forward to more from him in the future for sure!! This home-run of a zombie flick takes the audience on a journey filled with a few rules to follow if you want to survive a zombie invasion. The make-up for the zombies was very cool and the shot choices were spot on for a think-on-your-feet-style narrative. I was surprised to NOT see anyone (myself included) dressed up as zombies for this opening. Maybe people will be dressed up for it tomorrow. I recommend this one for fans of Zombies, comedy, action, and Twinkies....